Friday, January 14, 2011

These Cameo Parkway Reissues are WORTH IT!!

Here's the review over at PopMatters. The Dovells and Dee Dee you've heard; Zacherle was a case. Here's an excerpt:

How’s this for weird? In 1958, John Zacherle, a 40-year-old World War II veteran and TV horror movie host, went to the Philadelphia studio of Cameo Parkway to record a spoken-word piece of gruesome limericks. Cameo Parkway producer/guitarist Dave Appell laid down a two-chord backing track with the label’s house band. Dan Dailey punctuated the limericks with thick sax solos. At some point Zacherle’s friend Dick Clark stopped by to check on the song’s progress. (He’d later ask Zacherle to tame the song down for American Bandstand.) In the spring, “Dinner With Drac Part 1” hit #6 on the Billboard pop chart, despite lyrics about swimming in blood and eating mummy veins. Why you never hear this song on oldies radio is beyond me.